


Glitchtale Realistic AU: We Are All Made of Bones

by Nazareth_Rose



Category: Glitchtale - Fandom
Genre: Comedy, Comedy of Errors, Family Bonding, Family Drama, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Family Issues, For Kids, Honestly my age demographic is about 9-11 or so, Kid Fic, Kid-Friendly, Time Skips, Xenophobia, YouTube
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-17
Updated: 2020-11-17
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:55:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27603839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nazareth_Rose/pseuds/Nazareth_Rose
Summary: A Glitchtale AU where the main theme is it's supposed to be realistic and it comes from Asriel's perspective. Among other things, the monsters are just your regular old ethnic group with no superpowers, Sans and Asriel team up and become YouTube comedians, and Sans' family actually comes from South America for some reason. I attempted to model it off of novellas/novelettes intended for those in late grade school/early middle school.A cringy fanfic (albeit a long and at least somewhat enjoyable one) that I made over the summer of 2017 when I was just about to go to high school. This was about all I did for eight-hour days throughout the whole summer vacation.





	1. Prologue

Prologue  
November 30, 2016  
"We are all made of bones, fragile and strong all at once. We are all made of dust."  
-Brooke Shaden

Isn't it amazing how fragile and strong we are, all at once, living in beautiful yet fractured harmony and discord?  
There was a high schooler.  
Did he look like he was?  
No, never. In fact, he could often be found rummaging in the kids’ clothes aisles, trying to find something his size, and hiding in the clothes racks whenever kids from his school came down the aisle, forced to find something for their little siblings.  
But that didn’t matter.  
He was still a high-schooler, with the ability to point out that a seemingly dim star was part of Orion’s armpit, with as much grace throwing a football as a person trying to trip backwards in slow motion, and with such a liking for ketchup that with the amount of it that he liked on his burgers, everyone else would consider them ruined.  
There was a high-schooler, who just a few hours ago was smiling and laughing and blowing purposely loud notes on the trombone and doing practical jokes of every sort and trying to be right-side up in an upside-down world.  
And then… there wasn't.  
Yet there wasn't one x-ray that was taken that night.  
Not one.  
There was an elementary-schooler in the hospital bed that the nurses were staring at who was next to where the high-schooler was supposed to be once he was finished with surgery, who was trembling, whose breaths were frequent to the point of lightheadedness, whose heart fluttered in a messed-up way every time he looked towards where the high-schooler was wheeled off, who was the most timid, frightened creature that ever existed.  
He was me.  
The elementary-schooler, against the high-schooler's wishes, wanted to go back. He didn't want to be inside the chilling hospital room, where ceiling lights flickered and shadows thrived. The room was rife with perfectly-sanitized surfaces... too perfectly sanitized… the unnerving, ear-piercing sounds of wheels grinding against the floor in the hallway, and the various, disturbing sounds of illness from the other rooms.  
It was a terrible place to die.  
The elementary-schooler didn’t want to be here.  
He wanted to leave.  
And so he did.  
He closed his eyes.  
He shut out the occasional noise.  
He went to the past.  
He went back.  
He went back to the beginning.  
Does anyone care to join him?  
Do you care to join him?


	2. Chapter One: The Quasimodo Freakazoids of Ebott Elementary School

September 15, 2015  
School.  
Fourth grade.  
Mrs. Glass’ class.  
It’s been a long day. I started off by waking up at seven, and thinking that I had the power to control my body. That I could sleep for five minutes and use my own natural alarm without the help of any artificial alarm.  
I was dead wrong.  
When I woke up, it was eight thirty in the morning. I had to look at the clock twice because I couldn’t believe my eyes. How could I have slept that long? It was the first day of school, and I needed a good first impression!  
And that’s when everything started to go wrong.  
I couldn’t find anything half-decent to wear other than that itchy green-and-yellow striped sweater that has no text, but still screams, “MOMMA’S BOY”. There was no more milk, so I had to eat my cereal dry.  
It reminded me of dust, and I couldn’t rid myself of the taste of it for hours.  
I stare at the computer monitor for one second and my eyes instantly glaze over. The unrelenting monitor stares at me back. We play chicken like that for a few minutes, seeing who will blink first. Of course, I know the monitor will win.  
My subconscious detects a drop of sweat emerging and then lazily oozing down my face.  
The online quiz title is called “Getting to Know You Quiz!” in sans-serif Helvetica font. The title name was probably the most generic thing that the teacher was thinking of at that moment, the most rushed thing she could’ve possibly came up with at the moment. I wouldn’t blame her for this little “shortcut.” Who’d want to go the extra mile in every little thing that you did after watching a bunch of hormonal, cannibalistic tweens all day for sixty years of your life? But all things aside, she couldn’t have been more wrong when it came to making the title.  
Because these next questions aren’t just about “getting to know you”.  
It tells you what other people will think of you when they walk by you. It tells you how long that they’ll stare at you when they realize that you’re different. It tells you what specific insults they’ll call you when they look at you. It tells you whether or not you’ll be allowed to buy things, or have fun with everyone else, or even whether you’ll be allowed to live in certain places.  
Really, it tells you how much of a chance you have out there.  
I scroll down the quiz with a purple background, skimming it. It asks me generic questions that I would probably see on a social media setup page. It asks me questions like, “What is your name?” “How old are you?” “What is your race?” and “What is your gender?”  
But as I skim past one of the questions at about the middle of the quiz, I’m startled. Not just shocked, but startled. I’ve been dreading this question for months, years, even, and I’ve finally come across it.  
Because this year, they’ve put a question in there that none of the other kids say that they’ve ever seen in the past years.  
The question is, “What is your species?”  
This is a real oddity. This question hasn’t been on the test for as far as anyone can remember or as far as I can remember- I’ve been to this school as long as everyone else, I’ve the luck of not having to move to a different school all of a sudden- but it worries me. It deeply worries me.  
I’m almost scared to answer.  
I haven’t been this intimidated at a few pixels of sans-serif Helvetica font in my whole life.  
I do the quiz, answering each and every question, the energy and life being sucked out of me as I complete each question.  
“What is your name?”  
Asriel Dreemurr.  
“What is your age?”   
Ten.  
“What is your gender?”  
Male.  
“What religion do you belong to?”  
Christianity.  
And finally…  
“What is your species?”  
I stare blankly at the monitor. Do I answer truthfully or not? If I answer truthfully, it will be sent to the census, and it will be published and shown to gosh knows who, and everyone will know that one extra monster attended Ebott Elementary School.  
But if I don’t answer truthfully, my answer can easily be traced back to me. I can get as much trouble for lying on this as cheating on a test. Or worse.  
So my options are either being made fun of by others or ending up with more punishment than I’ve received in my ten years of my life.  
What’s a kid to do?  
“What is your species?”  
I hesitate, and slowly type the word which has caused so much controversy over the past few months- so many news anchors throwing hissy fits about us, so many hurtful words being aimed at us during school and in late nights out on the streets, so many of us being beaten and left to die by others.  
I hunt-and-peck. No touch typing.  
Finger by finger.  
Letter by letter.  
I look like a four-year-old when I type.  
I answer the question with this one word that’s had more significance on my life than almost any other.  
MONSTER.  
I type it in all caps because I’m angry. Not just “turn-caps-lock-on” angry. I mean “Press-SHIFT-key-and-then-press-each-and-every individual letter as hard as you can” angry.  
I’m angry because I never asked to be born like this.  
I never asked to be born a monster.   
I never asked to be part goat.  
I never asked to be born with a hideous appearance.  
I never asked to have long ears that stretch all the way down to my shoulders that look like the most stretched earlobes in the world, or a long snout as a nose that makes it look awkward whenever I blow my nose.  
I never asked to walk on two legs, yet have vampirish teeth for upper canines.  
I never asked to have albino-white skin which makes me look like I’m always sick.  
I never asked to have fur that I have to stuff under my clothes, which makes my poor white skin overheat easily and get burnt.  
I never asked to be named “Asriel Dreemurr”, the type of name that you hear and you say, “Is that literally his name? Like what you find on a birth certificate? Wow, what type of cruel parents would ever name a kid that?!”  
Now, out of pure boredom, I take out a piece of scrap paper, take a pencil, wipe off that drop of sweat, and write  
Dreemurr  
Creemurr- that would be my name in gym. If I’m ever good at it. Which I’ll never be.  
Leemurr  
Deemurr  
Teamurr  
Gleemurr  
Scheemurr- mwahahaha  
Reemurr  
Meemurr- I’d love that  
Beemurr  
Beliemurr  
Belieber  
Beiber?  
Screemurr  
This test makes me want to SCREEMURR SCREEMURR SCREEMURR  
I giggle a little and quickly look back onto the monitor to play chicken again, pretending to be busy, hoping nobody could hear the giggle in the teacher-forced silence of the room.  
I have one more question to finish in this “quiz”.  
“What is your race?”  
I think a little bit. Well, what IS my race?  
I’m definitely not one of the human races that you normally think about that. I have white skin, but that’s LITERAL white skin. Bone-white skin. Not peach like the “white” folks that most normally think about. My skin’s no help to me whatsoever when it comes to this question.  
So, I answer in my childish hunting-and-pecking way,  
Anglo-Nubian Goat.  
Because I prefer goats to people.  
Even though I’ve never met an actual goat before besides on Google Images and in a few petting zoos.  
I press submit. The quiz, in its default message after someone finishes, says, “Congratulations! You have finished the quiz!”, even though I feel no accomplishment whatsoever. Mrs. Glass lets me socialize with the other kids that are done.  
She thinks she’s doing me a favor letting me interact with other kids. She thinks she’s creating a little helpful dose of camaraderie that studies show is helpful in children's mental development.  
But she’s not.  
In fact, instead of hopeful anticipation, dread courses through me as I know that I’m about to see a perfect example of…


	3. Chapter Two: Why I Prefer Goats to People

I tentatively approach the other children. I know the kids’ names in the little circle that they’ve formed on the floor beside the computers. In fact, I’m painfully aware of their names. Sure, I’ve heard their names time and time again when it came to things like who got all A’s or who creamed everyone in dodgeball, but all of that was just a cover-up to their true mean spirits… shown in the hallways and bathrooms in classrooms when there were no adults around, as they chose anyone- anyone- and bullied them. It was like a disease- an infection- with no cure. Their true self would come out, and it took a lot to hold it back in again.  
Or is there more to these kids than I know? Do they astound some at some times, and deride others at other times, with no “true” self at all?  
It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t.  
Either way, unless they clean up their act and hold back their mean-spirited demons, their primal, hormonal tendencies, they’re not earning my friendship at all. Not even a second of my time will be wasted on them.  
Unless the time wasted on them is forced, like this one.  
They used to be better. They used to restrain their mean spirit better. But around a few years ago, before this sudden “monster hate craze” kicked in when the Anti- Monster Department started up, something clicked. Whether it was natural or not, I don’t know. At the rate that they’re going, it’s probably not. They started becoming meaner to not just me, but to their friends.  
To their friends.  
They used to be… not friends with me, that’s a separate topic… but acquaintances when I was in the lower grades. I used to say “Hello” to them and make small talk in the hallways, play games with them during recess, and was always willing to partner up with them for projects, little or big, if they were sans a buddy that was in that class. They used to enjoy me, or at least tolerate me.  
Well… that was a long time ago.  
Over the summer, the Anti-Monster Department formed- an absolutely horrid organization that executes its title pretty well. What it did was it basically brainwashed the public. It got into the news, it got into textbooks… it got into EVERYTHING! It was like a Youtube video… always being shared from one place to another, until everyone’s seen it. It told everyone that monsters were dangerous, and those three words, “monsters are dangerous”- backed by essays and news reports- fueled a lot of the fire for everything that’s going on. Why the humans are hating the tiny amount of us that are here. At first, I shrugged it off, saying that there was no big deal and there were other things to worry about. And to be honest, there were. And they still are.   
Until it started to affect me. Not in big ways, but it started to affect me.  
During May, I was running home from the bus fast as I could, laughing and panting and gasping, never minding that my slower, also part-goat-and-part-monster parents were lagging behind as I was trying to beat my bus mates.  
During August, they would run to home as fast as they could… but it wasn’t a race this time.  
This time, they wanted to get rid of me. They were scared of me.  
Me, who didn’t even have the courage to climb a rock wall. With a HARNESS. Me, who couldn’t muster up the nerve to kill a spider in class. All of a sudden, it’s like the Red Scare, but with us as the Communists. “Monsters are dangerous” seems to be the only thing that everyone says these days. Everyone got brainwashed by the Anti- Monster Department, since it has ties to the media. It’s like I’m living in a zombie apocalypse.  
Except the zombies got turned into humans, and not the other way around.  
Now, I’m the only zombie around. I’m the only one with fangs, albino-white skin, and floppy ears. I’m the only “not normal” one around. There’s not much monsters around to begin with, in fact.  
I bet that the Anti- Monster Department got to the media through bribery.  
People, for the most part, were used to me before last summer. They would talk about the latest movies, how ugly our own school looked compared to the other schools in the county, how they tried to finish homework at an ungodly fast pace in order to get good grades for the next semester, how they were getting a new drone from Amazon… the list was virtually endless.  
Now, all that anyone says is that I’m a freak. That I’m dangerous and can’t be around anyone. That I’ll never get anything accomplished in my life, no matter how much I try, because I’m a filthy monster. That I’m a loser, and that I don’t belong here. Or anywhere. That I might as well die, because I won’t contribute to anything at all and will just be a drag on everyone.  
What the heck is going on?  
There’s Joe Hawley to the left, with skin that other humans consider pale but still isn't nearly as white as mine. His blue-tinged hazel eyes gleamed the way that they did just before he shot out an insult. His insults- and the insults of the other children- had become so numerous and so frequent that I was able to catch every detail just before he or another kid shot another insult out.  
I hoped I was wrong.  
I hoped that his eyes were lying.  
I hoped that my predictions were lying.  
There’s Jennifer Calhoun, the girl in the middle, with long and dirty blonde hair which has become more and more common in our class. She’s the current, temporary ringleader of the small group of children. In just the course of a few short minutes, back when Joe and the other kids had just finished their tests, she had taken him and the other kids under her social protection, whether they were aware of it or not. No child that had finished the test was sitting alone, like I wanted and was trying to do. They all hung out in the little area where Joe, Jennifer, and the rest of the kids were in order not to feel isolated during that short time after the test, desperate for someone- anyone- to keep them from loneliness and isolation, if only for a few minutes.  
But being isolated is much better than being ridiculed.  
“Shup, Ashiel?” Jennifer asks. She’s chewing on so much rose-pink bubble gum that it’s giving her a lisp. I can spot a few tiny dribbles of spit coming out of her mouth. Jennifer wipes it, apparently not caring about what anyone thought of her. She sticks out her tongue a few times, her tongue draped by the sickly pink gum, in unsuccessful attempts to blow a bubble. Then, after a few moments and attempts, she successfully blows a bubble, trying to make it as big as she can. But it inevitably pops. Not seeming to care and willing to try this practice again, she gathers the gum back into her mouth to prepare for her next set of words. “Howsh the lil goatkid goin’?”  
So, this is a good sign. Jennifer hasn’t insulted me yet. But I have a feeling that someone else is going to, just to fill in her space. Someone is going to catch on that no one is making fun of the mutated goatchild trying to sit with them. Trying to become part of them again. Trying and failing not to be socially rejected.  
“Ugh, that test was awful!” I reply a little too enthusiastically, glad to make actual conversation instead of trying to find a half-decent comeback.  
“So...” Joe said. His eyes glint again, and I flinch. Please, don’t be right, Asriel, please don’t be right…  
“How’d you like that new question?”  
I was right!  
The other kids chuckle and immediately adrenaline surges through me. It seems that my body’s already recognized them as threats. “Hey, hey, knock it off!” I reply. My face reddens. For the first time in awhile, I hope that there’s a teacher in the room. I look around and I find no teachers. A new wave of dread floods me.  
Jennifer laughs. “Shtupid monshters,” Jennifer says. I clench my gum-free teeth and I find myself on the verge of punching Jennifer’s stupid teeth and that stupid piece of pink gum (sorry for the language), taunting me more and more by the second. But I am far from having anger issues. In fact, this is the closest I’ve gotten to thoughts of violence ever since the Anti-Monster Department ruined everything over the summer.  
That doesn’t stop me from being so caught up in the moment that I don’t notice that the third child, Fred Jacobs, has slipped behind me with his short, slender body. He runs regularly, and he has, over the years, perfected the art of running like a ninja. His footsteps are quieter than the faintest whisper.  
I feel a sting on the palm of my hands as the soft paper in my hand leaves me and Fred’s fingernails, badly in need of cutting, scratch my bone-white skin and turn it red. Ordinarily, I would’ve worried about infection- gosh knows where his nails have been! But this isn’t an ordinary moment. This is far from an ordinary moment.  
I wince and gasp. With the paper gone, whatever’s coming next, it isn’t going to be good.  
“Hey, what’s this, you freak?” Fred asks. I hear snickering behind me and I know it isn’t good. Oh gosh, oh gosh, oh gosh, it isn’t good.  
“Wh-” I say, mortified. I look up, and Fred’s smirking at me with perfect teeth that I don’t have, tauntingly waving the paper that I had doodled on for the test.  
Of all the papers that I could’ve written, out of all the times that someone could’ve stolen it, why now? Why this paper?  
“Hey, give it back!” I shout. Without hesitation, I spring to my feet and chase Fred around the other two children in a vicious round of duck-duck-goose, the room and its furnishings becoming nothing but blurs racing around me. I make a beeline for Fred, trying not to crash into the other items in the classroom. Other kids finish their tests just to watch me. They form a crowd. I can hear them laughing, but some of them whisper about me. I can’t catch up with Fred- who wastes his life running forever and ever, not willing to make time to study for his tests, unlike me- and immediately someone judges. I hear him say, “How many burgers do you figure that kid ate today?”, and laughs follow. I tear up, and the already blurry objects become almost imperceptible. I blink my eyes twice and force back the tears. Oh, no, there’s no way I’m crying at school! People are recording this and spreading through social media, and the whole world may see it! There’s absolutely no way that the world will watch me cry! Through the blurs, I can spot a cellphone, the flash from it taking a video hurting my eyes. I pant and refocus on Fred, who’s continuing to read the note with his mocking voice.“Stop it!” I yell (I would yell, “Stop, I can’t keep up with you!”, but again, the entire world may see this. Can you imagine the humiliation if the world saw that?).  
Fred ignores me and smirks as he runs, continuing to read the note aloud without effort.  
“This test makes me want to screemurr?!” He bursts out in laughter. Someone in the crowd yells, “Teach that little monster freak how to spell,” and the people around him burst out in hysterical laughter,  
The other kids react in various ways. My face turns beet-red, and not just from running.  
I focus on Fred, my anger reaching a climax now. I reach out my hand, with my own claws stretched out towards him. “GIVE IT BACK!” I yell.  
I don’t yell a lot.  
But I’m not myself.  
I’m so caught up in my anger that I don’t notice Jennifer’s outstretched leg, or her smile, and I lose my balance. The last thing that I notice is the shag carpet, littered with dirt, before I face-plant in it. My face is red-hot. I sit up and rub my forehead.  
There’s no teacher to witness the horror. She’s probably outside in the hallway sipping on her coffee, taking a break, the way that I’ve seen some people take a break to smoke a cigarette.  
Jennifer laughs and rips my paper into a million pieces as she throws them in the trashcan. She spits her gum out into one of the pieces, and her lisp is gone. She smirks and looks directly into my eyes, wanting to absorb every detail of my reaction. Involuntarily, I tear up and Jennifer notices.  
“Awww, you poor crybaby!” Jennifer says. Guess the world will see me cry anyway. I can hear other kids snickering and laughing, each exhibiting one of their usual responses. I hear “Oh my god!”s and “Oh, shoot!”s, and some other words that I can’t say.  
It’s anarchy.  
The teacher returns to the classroom, shouting at the other kids to calm down. The anarchy dissipates and a temporary peace forms. The phones are put away, the smiles wipe off of their faces.  
As we head back to our seats, Joe smirks at me. “You filthy monster.”  
He laughs and kicks me, though not hard, as he triumphantly marches to his seat.  
That, ladies and gentlemen, is why I prefer goats to people.


	4. Chapter Three: So I Have Friends. Surprising, I Know.

The bell finally rings for recess. Thank gosh, I think.  
I think that profanity is far from the best way to do normal conversation- it makes you look more demanding, more hostile, more quick to insult others.  
So I never swear unless it’s an extreme situation- even in my thoughts.  
Normally, all kids are excited for recess- this is a universal fact, it doesn’t take an Einstein to figure that out. But no one in Mrs. Glass’ class, at least, is excited as me. Ten minutes before the bell, I already have all of my things put away that Mrs. Glass has allowed us to. No one else even thinks about that. No, they’re too busy spitting out lies from the Anti- Monster Department about how I’m a freak and don’t belong anywhere! Five minutes before the bell, I prepare to leave my seat, subtly enough so Mrs. Glass doesn’t notice me, or at least catch me in the act. I sit up, my back straight, and scooch slightly back, trapped in a slightly awkward position. I can’t do any more than that because I’m scared that Mrs. Glass will notice. Then, that’ll lead to punishment, and then my rhabdophobia, which we’ll talk about later. Finally when the bell rings, I spring out of my seat, kicking it back like I do on most days. I push it back in half-heartedly and am the first one to form the line.  
Others snicker at me for doing that. Others call me the “teacher butt kisser of the class” for doing it, just because I stand closest to Mrs. Glass. But I don’t really talk a lot with the teacher, if at all.  
I speed walk as fast as I can- school’s forced me to be a master at speed walking- and move the line forward quickly. Some people, most of them not caught up in conversation, get the hint and catch up with me, but there’s always that one kid that lags behind and forces the entire line to slow down.  
I wonder if that person could be me in a different universe.  
I hear Mrs. Glass’ shrill voice screeching in the background, telling everyone to get in order. Since the first school began, it’s been every elementary school teacher's dream to get everyone in order, to get everyone to march in a forward line like soldiers about to be deployed into battle.  
But knowing how primal these people are, that will forever be a dream.  
The line is a confused mixture of chaos. You can’t even call it a “line” anymore. Kids are scattered around the hallways, talking to their friends. Often, we have to stop at certain points to get the line into a halfway decent order before chaos starts once again and I have to wait while the other kids get back in line. It’s like waiting for a TV episode to come out, grabbing the remote to watch it, and then being told that it’s still in production and that you have to wait a bit more.  
But what channel does that, anyway?  
Finally, when the doors open to go outside and the dams break, other kids run. But most of them don’t run as fast as me. I run as fast as I can, but not nearly as fast as Fred or any of the others who actually spend time running, but it’s still as fast as I can. And fueled by my excitement to finally achieve a little freedom, it’s a bit faster.  
I make a beeline for two kids standing by the tallest slide, being careful not to smash into any of the other kids. That would be bad. And I don’t need any more embarrassment today anyway.  
“Hey, Betty,” I say to one of the kids. She smiles and waves at me. She smiles a lot, and when she laughs, her smile gets ten times bigger. In fact, she’s one of the peppiest, happiest kids that you could ever meet. Her full name is Amber Betty Noire, but nobody calls her Amber except for her mom. Everyone else calls her Betty as a nickname. Betty’s a real sweetheart- she’s always that one neighbor that bakes you a pie or something like that if you move in. If you mentioned the word “donation” to her, she’d flip out. She’d give you as much of her allowance as she could and wish that she could give more.  
She’d be Smurfette in another universe.  
“Hey, Azzie!” she says. “How’re you feeling today?”   
She asks that a lot. Unlike Frisk, she’s more concerned with feelings than actions. It’s my one nitpick about her.  
I sigh, closing my eyes, and the fresh memories of what happened just a half hour ago assault me. The insults that were said today echo and reverberate in my head, even though I don’t want them to. I can even remember where they emphasized words. They repeat over and over again in my head, like a movie that I want to get out of. I know that they don’t matter as much as actions, but that doesn’t stop them from stinging. “Stupid monster… how many burgers did that kid eat? Someone teach that kid how to spell… you little freak…”  
I remember them all.  
I remember every one.  
Even though those who said them will probably forget- they will probably deny that they said them- I will remember them for years and years to come.  
Not like I want to, but I will.  
My mind will always make sure that this is so.  
Frisk, with his observant curiosity, must have noticed that I wasn’t myself. My sigh was somewhat quiet, just a little bit more than an exhale, but somehow, Frisk managed to catch it, or some other sign that I wasn’t myself.  
“Not good, huh?” Frisk says, adjusting his leather notebook in his hand. Unlike Betty’s not-as-pale-as-mine skin, Frisk’s is fair and a healthy mix of brown and peach, and unlike Betty’s wide pink eyes which she says is made possible with color contacts, Frisk’s eyes are small and naturally brown.  
“Hey,” Betty says, pointing to a piece of paper that fell on the floor. “What’s that?”  
Betty pounces on the grass to get it out of her own type of curiousity, different from Frisk’s. But Frisk stays in his spot, unmoving, staring at Betty with his brown eyes. He’s not… unfit, per se, but his name is definitely misleading- he’s not frisky at all. Frisk is definitely less of the peppy, energetic, friendly one and more of the quiet, kind, observant one. He always has a Rubik’s cube on hand which he says that he’s solved three times… at first, I thought it was a lie, until he did it in front of me and caused my jaw to drop for the first time in a long time… and he always has his leather notebook in his hand, ready to jot down things that inspire him. Things that move him.  
It can be something big and obvious, like a speech at a ceremony that was clearly supposed to move people, or a scene in the movie with every variable tailored to make it moving.  
Or it can be something little, like the sheer love that parents give to their children or everyday sacrifices that friends make for each others.  
On the really rare occasion that Frisk’s guard is let down- almost always by something unavoidable- and I get to peek into his leather notebook just before he catches me (I told you that he was observant), those little things… Especially the sacrifices in life… fill up most of his notebook.  
I really appreciate that he notices those kinds of things. It’s not like I don’t care about these capeless heroes, it’s just that I’m not able to. I’m not observant enough. With Frisk’s gift, I guess those heroes don’t go unsung after all. And I really appreciate that.  
But despite Betty and Frisk’s differences, they’re still my friends.  
And also, in terms of some variables of their appearance, they look like twins. They have the same length of raw umber (not amber) hair... Betty just has hers dyed at the ends (she says her pink obsession is because pink is supposed to symbolize happiness, youthfulness, and fun!). They both can be seen with some of the same habits, each having the same pencil-chewing and hair-fiddling tendencies. They probably got them from each other, having the privilege to sit together in the same class. Every day.  
They’re also both right-handed.  
Alright… I know. That was a dumb example. I’m running out of similarities here.  
One other thing that you may notice is that Betty and Frisk are both humans.  
Yes, I surrender. You figured it out. I don’t have any monster friends. At all. I know, hypocritical, right? Here I am, sick of the Anti- Monster Department, and I don’t even have the authority to say that I’m friends with a single monster in this entire planet!  
Well… I guess this is because that there are very few monsters in existence in the first place (people say that compared to most other places in the world, Ebott has a pretty darn-sorry for the language- low concentration of monsters), and there’s only one monster for every twenty people, which equates to about twenty five monsters in my school in the first place. But some of them just aren’t friendly, others just aren’t the kind of friend I want to be with. So I guess I’m stuck here.  
But it’s also because… well… ugh, should I tell this?  
I’m… to say the very least… not adventurous. To begin, my food palate is very limited, and I’m almost always stuck eating the same foods- foods that I know taste decent. I’m a mess at parties with food involved. I don’t want to risk eating a different type of food and risk it tasting terrible, it starting up my gag reflex- believe me, it’s not pretty when that happens-, allergies, food poisoning or choking.  
It is estimated that twenty thousand people die every year due to either choking or food poisoning.  
That’s one person dying every hour.  
I don’t want to be one of them.  
But on a bigger level, I have a lot of phobias. Betty’s pointed this out. In fact, it’s the paper that she found on the floor just a few seconds ago. Thank gosh she’s the one that pounced on it and found it and someone like Jennifer Calhoun didn’t grab it. That would be an absolute nightmare.  
“These are your fears?” she says.  
“Y-yeah…” I say timidly. “These are mine…”  
Acrophobia (fear of heights)  
Algophobia (fear of pain)  
Claustrophobia (you probably know what that is)  
Coulrophobia (fear of clowns)  
Demonophobia (fear of demons)  
Glossophobia (fear of public speaking)  
Hemophobia (fear of blood)  
Hoplophobia (fear of firearms- a biggie!)  
Lilapsophobia (fear of tornadoes or hurricanes)  
Nosophobia (fear of contracting disease)  
Phasmophobia (fear of ghosts)  
Phonophobia (fear of loud noises)  
Rhabdophobia (fear of punishment and criticism- this is a BIG ONE!!!)  
Spheksophobia (fear of wasps)  
Taphophobia (fear of being buried alive)  
Thanatophobia (fear of dying- also a big one)  
Toxiphobia (fear of being poisoned)  
As you can see, I’m a huge coward. If you’d say that there was someone who was more of a coward than me, I’d say that you were lying.  
To be honest, I’m not sure why Betty and Frisk hang around me with this many fears.  
But I know one thing for certain.  
I don’t have teraphobia.  
Not tetraphobia.  
Teraphobia.  
I trust that anyone who reads this has the ability to find out what teraphobia is for themselves.  
“Yeah…” I say, scratching the back of my overheating neck as the sun beats down on me. I wipe the sweat off of my neck. “I know. That’s a lot, right?”  
“Well…”, says Frisk. “There’s definitely some that’s unreasonable, and will probably take some systematic desensitization to overcome…”  
I sigh. They’re my friends, but I’m so much of a coward that no niceness or any other trait will ever cover it up.  
“I know,” I say. “I’m a pantophobic, huh? I’m just a sissy chicken… I-”  
“But…” Frisk says, interrupting me.  
There’s always a ‘but’.  
“I actually have a bunch of these myself!” Frisk gives the paper to Betty, and readjusts his precious notebook and paper and his hands. “Not bad…”  
“You’re not a coward!” Betty says. “These may look like a lot, but everyone has these! To be honest, who isn’t scared of dying, or demons, or pain, or- ugh, I’m getting really morbid here. But in all honesty, there’s probably a bunch of kids here that have a lot worse and a lot weirder fears! Like the fear of hair, the fear of taking a bath-which I bet a lot of kids have here, haha!”  
I smile, knowing that at least one person thinks that I’m not really a coward, and in the spirit of happiness, I reply with a loud “ain’t that the truth!” which turns some heads. Some people snicker and some laugh, and I can hear a few insults.  
Once I do, the atmosphere of happiness decreases substantially.  
Betty and Frisk must have caught on.  
“Don’t listen to them, none of what they say is true,” Betty says.  
“They’re the most narrow-minded people I’ve ever met,” Frisk remarks.  
“You’ve definitely got that right,” Betty whispers, trying not to insult anyone. Classic Betty.  
The recess bell rings.  
“Bye, Frisk, bye, Betty,” I say.  
They wave to me and head to Mrs. Magnolia’s line.  
People say that I couldn’t have been in Mrs. Magnolia’s class because it was “too full”. I bet in that class I wouldn’t have to deal with Joe or Fred or stinking Jennifer Calhoun or anyone, because I wouldn’t be alone! But no, I had to stay in Mrs. Glass’ class- she barely even cares about us!- just because Mrs. Magnolia’s class was “too full”.  
An entire year of being deprived of precious time with my two best and only friends in the whole wide world, just from two words.  
“Too full”.


	5. Chapter Four: The (Un)Surprising Tyranny of Grades

October 8, 2015

One month passes, but it doesn’t fly by. They say that the reason that kids are much more impatient and demanding than adults is because time is supposed to slow to a crawl when you’re a kid compared to an adult, and I can be the first to tell you that that’s true. I’m a kid myself. And it’s no wonder that time seems to slow to a crawl for me. For nine months out of the year, at least- summer vacation is seeming to get shorter and shorter every year- I have to spend five days a week and seven hours a day- thirty five hours a week- being bullied and derided in all of my classes, looking desperately at the clock every twenty minutes, silently begging it to move faster so lunch or recess or dismissal will come, depending on the time of day, with no sort of happiness or companionship or anything to look forward to in the day except for recess, lunch, and dismissal. To be completely honest, Betty and Frisk are the only two reasons that I go to school. At all. During school, I can see them easier. I don’t have to make preparations or schedule for them to come. They’re just there, and I can spend the time with them that I have.  
When both Betty and Frisk are absent by forces that they cannot control- they know my situation and they stay in school as often as possible for my sake (see how good friends can be?!)- my school life is turned into seven hours of torture by everyone else- by my apathetic teacher and my cruel classmates. There’s nothing but bullies, bullies, bullies, left and right, all because I’m a monster. The stupid (sorry for the language) Anti- Monster Department is the reason for all of this. Oh, if and when I find out who leads this, I’ll teach her a lesson.  
But I’m not a violent person. Oh, no, I legitimately wouldn’t hurt a fly unless it was becoming too annoying for me to think. But- there’s always a ‘but’ nowadays, nothing is certain- how else will I be able to make it all stop? When will it stop? When will it stop with the lies and the force-feeding of them? When will it stop? When?  
After emotionally exhausting myself every day from Monday to Friday with the bullies at school and the Anti- Monster Department attacking almost every other aspect of my life and trying to keep up with all the duties of my life, I look to the calendar hanging on the school bulletin one day and discover that two months have passed by.  
That time passed by is slow and hard earned by labor, toil, and bullying. Before I know it- okay, that’s a lie, I’ll know it by then, I’ll be painfully aware of it- I’ll get to the end of the school year, I’ll get to get off of the toxic yellow bus for one last time, I’ll get to run home as fast as I can for one last time, and I’ll get to spend three months with nobody but me, my family, Frisk, and Betty. No more bullies, no more apathetic teachers, and no grades to worry about for three months. Three months! Ninety whole days!  
It’s just a matter of gritting my teeth, getting out of bed, getting on with my work, pressing on, and moving forward until that new sun peeps over the horizon during the summer and the happy time finally comes.  
Another battle has been won today. And I’m happy. I’m genuinely, really, happy. For the first time in a long time… how long has it been? Days? Weeks? Months?... I’ve given a bully who sympathized with the Anti- Monster Department- I don’t know his name, and I don’t care what his name is- a good comeback which sent him reeling and warded him off from me for the rest of the day. I run home with an extra spring in my step, triumphant.  
I go to my room, close the wood door behind me, and flop over my bed with a red comforter, my bone-white limbs stretched out over the red bed like hyperextended pieces of spaghetti and my body stretched into a backwards Y-shape over the center of my bed, staring at the ceiling and its patterns of paint that look like scattered raindrops. I don’t go into this backwards Y-shape position a lot, in fact I only go into it in two situations- only either when I’m really tired or when I’ve come across rare victories like this.  
And I guess this counts as both tiredness and victory.  
I’m burnt out, but it’s a good type of burnt out. It’s the same type of burnt out I feel when I type an essay for school that took me a while that I’m actually proud of for once, or the type of burnt-out that I feel when I’m exhausted from walking for hours in a charity walk. It’s that type of burnt-out.  
I hear a loud knocking on my bedroom door. It’s loud and deliberate, and not half-hearted. It must be my parents.  
“Yes?” I say with a little sigh, a bit frustrated that they’ve taken away the little time that I’ve had all day to relax. I stretch for a bit, reluctantly come out of my Y-shape, wrinkling the comforter on my bed, and approach the door. I twist the doorknob and it opens.  
And as soon as I do, I immediately know that something is horribly, horribly wrong.  
For one thing, I see my report card in my mom’s hand. Darn! (Sorry for the language). That must have come in the mail today! I knew this day would come, it was unavoidable. It’s just with my life so full of ridiculing and bullies and the stupid Anti- Monster Department and stupid Jennifer Calhoun with her stupid gum (sorry again for the language), I haven’t had time to worry about that.  
And I also suspect something is wrong when my mom says, “Asriel, your father and I need to talk with you.”  
That’s never a good sign. It always means something is wrong, that it won’t work out in my favor somehow. Either I’m in trouble, or there’s bad news. It always ends up like that somehow. My mother, significantly shorter than my father, walks in the room, my father towering above and bumbling behind her, each with identical albino-white skin, long snouts, long canines, and floppy ears, like mine. How they can be so accepted by and accepting of their appearance, while meanwhile here I am, hating my own appearance and being ridiculed for it?  
I back up to sit at my office chair so they can’t corner me. I hear the squeaking of the old, rusty wheels across the hardwood floor. I wonder, Oh, what could be wrong now?  
“Asriel,” my mom says in her sweet-as-honey voice. Not Betty sweet. There’s hundreds of different types of sweet. Betty is cotton-candy sweet. Mom is honey-sweet.  
There’s a difference. A big difference.  
“Your grades have become… “ The honey-voice waves me goodbye. “A little bit concerning… Your father and I have noticed that your grades have slipped from As and Bs to Cs, mostly, and one B-.”  
I know why this is. Studies have shown that kids who are bullied are less likely to make good grades. This is because the poor bullied kids have almost no motivation in school. They’re constantly worried about the bullies, and not anything else. Bullies are the only thing that occupies their day. Bullies, it seems, are the only thing that occupies MY day.  
But no, no, no, no, there’s no way I’m telling that to Mom and Dad! They’ll get involved, and then the entire school will find out- don’t ask me how, they have their ways (social media, you know that I’m talking to you over there)- and that’ll just make everything much worse. I don’t want to be labeled as BOTH a monster freak and a momma’s boy, even though it may already be too late. So when my father asks for an explanation for this sudden plunge, I remain silent and just shrug. Silence is better than the one thing I can say. It’s either stay silent or be homeschooled at this point.  
Actually, homeschooling doesn’t seem all that bad at this point, even if it means no more seeing Betty and Frisk all day.  
Mom doesn’t seem to accept my shrug and silence. It seems as if she has some more to say. It’s as if she even suspects my little white lie.  
“Well, my child,” Mom says with her honey-sweet voice. “I’ve decided to sign you up for a program that is offered in your elementary school called ‘Big Amigos, Little Amigos’. It’s a program where high-schoolers drive over to the elementary school and tutor them and give them a little extra help in subjects that they have a little tiny bit of trouble with. It gives the high schoolers extra credit, too, so it works both ways! It’s a wonderful program, really wonderful, Asriel, you’re lucky that I signed you up…”  
Ugh! So they did get involved! Why do they try so hard? Too hard?  
I do a facepalm and then slide my hand down my face slowly before bringing it back to my side.  
“Mom!” I protest. I don’t roll my eyes at her- that would result in punishment, and remember my rhabdophobia?- but this is a bad enough situation to where I think my protesting is justified. “My grades are average! They’re not D’s or F’s or anything like that! And I haven’t been pulled for any special programs from my teacher. I’m fine, I’m passing all of my classes! I don’t need tutoring as long as I’m not failing! I-”  
“Asriel… ” my father says, interrupting my protests. He sounds slightly exasperated. “Your mother and I have been talking about this for a while, and after much debate, we’ve decided to sign you up for ‘Big Amigos, Little Amigos’ as a family decision…”   
I can’t help but think, Well, I’m part of the family, shouldn’t I have helped in the decision?!  
“It’s three to four PM after school every day…” my mom says as if this isn’t a big deal.  
Every day?! Monday to Friday? EVERY WEEK???  
My eyes widen in response to being overwhelmed by this new expectation of dedication, and my dad must have caught on. “Tori…” he says in a gentle yet loud and deep voice, addressing my mom. “I don’t think this is really necessary for Asriel… maybe Betty or Frisk can help him out instead… Frisk is really smart, haven’t you seen his notebook…. couldn’t he come over every Friday or something and help Asriel out? Sending high schoolers to help him sounds a little extreme, Asriel’s in fourth grade and probably won’t be able to keep up with them… you’re a teacher, surely you must know how bad it can be for learning development and whatnot…”   
My mother ends up putting her hand up, her fiery temper finally showing through the honey. She’s speaking rapid-fire, like a machine gun. “Our son is better than average, and so he deserves better than average grades. He needs extra help, an extra push to catch up, so he can give his grades a boost. This is our son we’re talking about here!”  
My father is silent, although his eyes remain stern.  
My mom turns back to me, her kind yet fiery green eyes that I inherited from her looking straight into mine. I’m made painfully aware of their color now. Dad’s are brown, but they show just a hint of indecisiveness, with a slight amount of anger. Mom smiles slightly.“I hope that this experience improves your skills, my child. I love you, Asriel, and I want you to be the best kid that you can possibly be. You’ll do great!” Mom pats my back, and both of my parents leave my bedroom.  
I close the door - I think a bit too hard- and sigh in relief. I stumble back to my bed, exhausted from the labors of the day.  
What are Mom and Dad THINKING??? I mean, I know my grades just may be a little bit low, but who cares? If you think about it, nobody’s going to care how you did in fourth grade! Or even fifth, or sixth, or seventh, or eighth, for that matter! They’re going to care about how you did in college and maybe high school, but never in the fourth grade! They’re expecting me to have high schoolers trying to teach long division or the basic properties of matter to fourth graders- who some adults consider little kids- like me, when they’re already learning calculus or even college math? Beyond calculus?! They’re already learning physics! No way will I be able to catch up with them!  
I faceplant in my softest pillow and lie there for a full minute.


	6. Chapter Five: The Runt of the Litter

October 9, 2015  
The next day, the morning and evening pass by relatively quickly compared to the other days that I normally live though that normally pass by like a piece of food digesting, and it’s only an ample amount of time instead of a painfully large amount of time until I’m standing in the middle of the fourth grade hallway with my small, green leather backpack on my back, barely aware of its weight after having gotten used to it after so many years, waiting for Betty and Frisk outside Mrs. Magnolia’s bright and cheerful classroom as they finish a Lofthouse sugar cookie with white icing and red sprinkles that the entire class got from all getting good scores on a big History test. Lucky kids. Not that I don’t want them to get those rewards. With how hard these tests are, they deserve it. I’m just a bit mad that we don’t get the same reward for the same effort. Mrs. Glass never does anything that’s remotely close to any sort of reward. The only thing that Mrs. Glass does to keep us in line and incline us to increase our test scores is to punish us if we do badly. I mean, it’s a good way to try and keep our scores up, but still… it’s just a little cruel, you know?  
When Betty and Frisk come out of the cheerful yellow classroom, their mouths white with icing from their sugar cookies, I chat with them about my worries. I do that a lot with them. Sure, I talk about things like a cool new species that was discovered over the previous weekend or compare our favorite types of chocolate and candy. But now, it seems that I talk about my fears and worries with them more than I talk about anything else with them.  
“Bye, guys,” I mutter, not quite wanting to say goodbye to my friends.  
“What’s wrong, Asriel?” Betty says, immediately catching on. That’s the only area that she’s more observant than Frisk- in emotional observation. Frisk seemed a bit wary, but not as quick as Betty was.  
“I’m just worried,” I admit. To them, it doesn’t seem like a total shocker. “What will these new high schoolers be like? I know that they’re a lot bigger and smarter than all of us. But my real question is… will they be nice or Jennifer Calhoun clones? Will they be thinking independently or fed lies by the Anti- Monster Department? I.. I just don’t know.”  
Frisk finishes writing an entry in his notebook, probably about the Anti- Monster Department. He likes to get political like that. He adjusts his glasses and smiles. “Don’t worry,” Frisk says. “As for the bullies, know that what they say isn’t true and it’s just the media getting too deep inside their heads. And do you know what else? Your grades will be better no matter how this turns out.”  
I smile a little. I know they’re trying their best.  
“I hope s-”  
The bell rings for them to go to the bus. I wave goodbye to Betty as she skips off to the buses and I wave goodbye to Frisk as he walks slightly behind her. I watch them as I stand against the hallway, bearing a few insults from strangers around the school, as Betty and Frisk become tinier and tinier until they change directions to go to their buses and leave Ebott Elementary, leaving me alone in the long, narrow corridors of the elementary school. With no one in the hallways- not even teachers- everything I do and say echoes down the corridor in an unsettling way.  
It’s still better than being in the company of anyone that approaches me that the Anti- Monster Department has zombified.  
Walking as slowly as possible, barely putting one foot in front of the other as I trudge through the corridors, taking the longest routes possible, I head to the bathroom as farthest away from the library as possible, my movements as slow as possible. I get myself a drink at the farthest water fountain from the library in the entire elementary school, and then reluctantly, inevitably trudge off to the library, where we’re supposed to meet the high-schoolers that we’ve been assigned for “Big Amigos, Little Amigos” by Mrs. Morris, the librarian with red glasses and the founder and leader of this entire program. Mrs. Morris is a nice lady. She kind of reminds me of my mom, but her voice is not quite as gentle, her eyes not quite as sweet.  
Just like Mrs. Glass, Mrs. Morris thinks she’s providing me with a great service by allowing me to be put in “Big Amigos, Little Amigos” so I could get a little bit of help with my schoolwork  
But she’s not.  
I pity her this time, unlike Mrs. Glass, who I don’t feel any positive emotions for other than happiness when a sub comes- Mrs. Magnolia is my favorite, obviously, but Mr. Yarbrough comes at a close second- and I don’t get to see Mrs. Glass’ flabby, toady face for a day. Which is a MAJOR plus for me.  
But as I walk to the library to meet the hopefully-nicer-than-Jennifer-Calhoun high schoolers, I glance at the Ebott Elementary school parking lot and I notice a band of primates sprinting to the front of the school. They’re all big and tall boys and girls that have signed up for this program for extra credit, all of them human. All of them are five or six footers that would be able to do a slam dunk easily and tower over most people. The boys have casual clothes, and the girls have skin-tight clothing that emphasizes the fact that they’re skinny as a rail. They’re all socializing, like they do constantly throughout the day, even when they’re running towards the school. No one’s without a crowd that they’re part of. I notice three crowds in the band of high schoolers. The first crowd, and the largest crowd, consists of three boys and two girls. The trend I notice among these is that all the boys are either scrawny or surly, and all the girls are skinny.  
I mean all of them.  
I catch a look on one of the boys in the largest crowd, who is big and surly. He looks like he’d easily beat up a child like me or even younger. He would have no physical or emotional negative consequences whatsoever. He has Nike sneakers that were probably the biggest in the shoe store, a white t-shirt, and a plaid sweater. He has brown, sweaty hair that screams “Basketball fanboy”. He sort of sets the standard for the rest of the kids in his crowd, and the other kids copy him in a sort of monotonous herd mentality. His thoughts are the group’s life breath. His word is immediate law. His wishes are their commands. Wherever he wants to go, they must migrate in order to stay alive.  
I’ve seen this far too often in school.  
There are two other crowds, each comprised of three members, one boy group and one girl group. They each keep to themselves, treating themselves and others as one solitary island, though the boy group is much rowdier than the girl group, and the girl group is much more gigglier than the boy group. But they all make the same caliber of dirty, offensive jokes that they call “small talk”.  
They’re all in their own specific group, each trying to maintain their own island. They each try to maintain the same space, the same certain aura of arrogance about them, and the same over social, sometimes hostile attitude. But it’s not their fault. Maybe it’s the fault of a few like that surly boy, but deep under all of this, I see that they could be something different, something much more different. They just don’t want to reveal it now. They stay now in their islands, in stereotypical teenage format, trying not to risk any sort of social punishment.  
Except for one.  
There’s just one of them that’s not quite like the rest. There’s just one that comes out of one of the cars, slams the door, and runs into Ebott Elementary School’s parking entirely on his own, remarkably- I think it’s one of the high schoolers’ little siblings, but I’m not sure, he got out of a car by himself, as if he drove here on his own - that, to my surprise, is not a human at all. I blink twice. There’s no other high school monsters that I’ve seen, which leads me to believe that he’s not a little kid. Surely this can’t be true, I haven’t had any monster friends all my life, only twenty other monsters have been to the school other than me, and surely he can’t be coming to my school to teach someone! He doesn’t have a tall stature like the other kids do, which I guess has some sort of “normalcy” to it, but what’s really not normal is that he doesn’t have the typical looks of a human, either.  
He’s white, and not just an ordinary white.  
He’s pale white. Just like me.  
In fact, he’s bone-white.  
No, literally. Bone white.  
His shade is the literal definition of bone white.  
He’s not just any type of monster… he’s a skeleton monster!  
I take a long, hard stare at him like he’s a circus performer, my mouth just slightly open and my body stopping from fidgeting. I lean my face against the door, attempting to take a closer look. I’ve only heard of skeleton monsters, their bodies are based off of what a human skeleton is supposed to look like- but I’ve never seen one before. Sure, I’ve seen some in Google Images, Youtube, health textbooks, movies, and things like that, but I’ve never seen one in person. However… I wouldn’t say that he’s exactly like a human skeleton. His eye-pits are bigger, the bones thicker and shorter in general, his smile rounder and bigger. This is probably what makes him a monster and not just a walking, living Halloween costume.  
I continue to stare at him. His eyes are vantablack pits with one tiny, tiny pupil, and they startle me for a few moments. Intrigued, I keep on staring at him, hoping that he doesn’t notice me stalking him. He runs down to the school, trying to catch up to the other high schoolers.  
He’s short- he’s definitely not five feet tall, and there’s no way he’s even close to six- so because of his short legs, his run focuses on having short but plentiful strides, rather than having long yet few strides.  
Eventually, he catches up with the other high school kids, smiling a little at his accomplishment, but one of the other kids- the surly one- pushes his head towards the ground, his grubby hand fitting and grabbing onto his entire skull and then shoving it to the hard, rough ground, the four-footer’s body being flung towards the ground helplessly like a ragdoll’s. His face- I mean skull- lands with a loud THUNK on the asphalt and the rest of his body flops on the asphalt uselessly. My stomach lurches as I’m disturbed by this. The surly boy laughs, along with his posse, and says a word- a terrible, awful word that I can't say or even think without feeling that something is terribly wrong- that makes me flinch, followed by “...you midget freak!”  
The flinch-word was the first word in the sentence.  
The other kids laugh, and I hear a few more flinch-words as they react. Nobody helps him. The other groups just stare at him and move on.  
I can relate to this kid. Poor guy.  
He’s the monster among the humans.  
He’s the spot of blue in a sea of pink.  
He’s the four-footer among the six-footers.  
He’s the freak among the normals.  
He’s the city person in a crowd of country people.  
He’s the runt of the litter.  
One of the high schoolers- the one that pushed the four-footer down- runs faster than the others and approaches the door. He presses his face and hands against the window and tauntingly sticks his pink tongue out at me. I flinch again. His saliva disgustingly gathers on the school window. Startled, I widen my eyes and step back. He seems to be relishing my reaction. A group of other high-schoolers that have followed him… all humans, a mix of boys and girls, from all groups, follow him more closely and continue to laugh, followed by flinch-words. The poor four-footer is staying as far away as possible from the people taunting me, rubbing his forehead with his porcelain-white hand and grimacing slightly. He bears this offense and these terrible, terrible words with a sort of modest patience.  
Like me.  
I smile inside at that.  
Mrs. Morris, the librarian comes to my rescue, her keys jingling like Santa’s sleigh on Christmas Eve night. She greets the kids at the door and tells me to go back to the library. Gladly, I run to the library and sit down alone at a table, awaiting to be paired with my Big Amigo. Please, don’t let it be that kid, I think, referring to the bully that pushed the four-footer down. Please. don’t let it be that kid. Please, don’t let it be that kid.  
As I’m reciting my silent prayer over and over again like a chant, shooting it up into the heavens like a popgun on rapid-fire, the door to the library is suddenly thrust open and careens to the wall so it bounces loudly and bounces off the library wall like a car off of a guard rail by the big bully. I flinch for what must have been the sixth time today. The bully sees my reaction and he and his posse laugh afresh. The flinch-words begin again, some addressing the fact that I was a monster.  
And then, he comes closer.  
What was I THINKING????


	7. Chapter Six: Accepting my Fate

The bully approaches me slowly, his grubby hand in a fist, ready to beat the living daylights out of me. Ready to treat me like a punching bag, just because he believes the Anti-Monster Department. And I’m a monster.  
I gulp, preparing for the first blow on my face, ready to turn my cheek purple in the midst of my pale face.  
And suddenly, a theory that I have had since the first day of elementary school in kindergarten comes true:  
Mrs. Morris is an an amazing woman. She’s a capeless superheroine.  
She dives in front of me and comes to my rescue once again, intervening. She stops the bully’s insults before he can even think of saying them. She stops him in his tracks before he can start the barrage of monster-directed punches. She blocks the bully’s punches before he even thinks of throwing them. She stops the brutality before it even happens.  
And all of this because she touches the bully’s shoulder.  
“Right, that’s enough of that,” she says. “Get to your seat, Thomas.”  
The bully backs off, shocked. And to be honest, I’m a bit shocked too.  
Mrs. Morris walks to the front of the room. “Quiet!” she says loudly.  
After a few minutes of last-minute conversations, mostly from the high schoolers, the library finally settles to a dull roar.  
“Alright, ladies and gentlemen,” she announces, grabbing her brown clipboard and preparing to read from it. She takes the pen from her ear and puts the lid on its end. “It’s time to assign our Big Amigos, who are high schoolers from across Pilgrim County looking for extra credit, to our Little Amigos, who are our elementary-school kiddos, who are having just a little trouble in their subjects, for the school year. These will be your partners for the rest of the year…”  
There’s a collective groaning from all of the students, my groan included. No! I’ll be stuck with the bully all year! No way! I guess I’ll just be a no-show after this…What will my parents say when I come home from the bus anyway... What will Mom and Dad say about my grades… My rhabdophobia kicks in and I know that in order to calm that fear, I have to stay through this. My fear controls me like a puppet.  
And I can’t escape.  
One of the other high schooler boys from the back of the library shouts, “That’s some bull!” No one addresses him, not even Mrs. Morris, who doesn’t punish everyone that she sees, but notices their misbehaviors.  
Mrs. Morris continues, looking all the way around the room over and over again, slowly, so that everyone can hear her voice. There’s some that choose not to hear her, but most physically can. “But… I’ve selected these pairings very carefully, and…. I think you all will enjoy them.”  
All the other teachers have say that.. Just before I get paired with Joe or Jennifer Calhoun or someone else, who are only nice to me when the teachers were looking. So this just may be the same situation, but on a different letter. This bully is starting to look more and more like my partner. I tense up in dread.  
Mrs. Morris smiles for a few seconds, looking in my direction, though I think it’s not on purpose, and then continues, looking at the high schoolers, mostly, but occasionally tilting her head towards us elementary schoolers.  
“ All high schoolers, please report to the back of the library. All elementary schoolers, please report to the front of the library.”  
The bully and his posse stalk over to a round table on the other side of the library, in the very back, while the other elementary schoolers walk up to the front to stand next to me. I don’t feel protected at all by the elementary-schooler army, though. I know that although there are enemies leaving me, there are also enemies drawing closer to me, too. I’m forced to live the saying “Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.” The bully gives me a scowl as he reluctantly walks over to the round table in the back of the library and shows his clenched fist to me as a silent threat, leading to another laugh from his posse. But after that, they’re gone. I’m free.  
For now.  
I’m too relieved to smile or make any other sort of celebration at my newest accomplishment. I give a sigh of relief instead. These high-school bullies are a lot worse than I originally thought, and seeing what that poor four-footer went through, I’m lucky that I got rid of them at all, for any amount of time.  
But still, I’m forced to form a scowl on my own face, like the bully did on his, as Jennifer Calhoun’s smirking face looks back at me, ready to insult me. She opens her mouth to begin the insults.  
But it’s funny, though. I’d rather be with Jennifer Calhoun than with that bully. I don’t want to end up like that four-footer anytime soon. I want to stay Asriel Dreemurr… for now.  
And if anyone ever told me that I’d ever say that, I’d say that they were deranged and that they needed to go to a mental hospital immediately before the brain damage becomes too severe.  
“Hah,” Jennifer remarks to her posse of her own, blowing her bubble with her rose-pink gum and then popping it. She collects the gum back in her mouth and then chews it again, like a cow. Her lisp is still there. After two months, she’s still stuck in this habit of hers. I doubt if she’ll ever break out of it. “Hey, guysh… I know that kid in the back in the plaid shweater. Shee him?”  
She points to the back of the room for a few moments, at the big bully in the plaid sweater- who’s pointing to the four-footer who has his head in his arms, probably bad-mouthing him or planning to do something worse than what I saw outside- then she puts her hand back down.  
“That’sh Thomash Knight. Gawd, I’d love to be paired up with him. I’d think we get along nicely. You guysh know why?”  
“No, why?” Joe asks. So Joe’s here, too. Just my luck! Three bullies I know in one room! One more reason to be a no-show. I sigh. Despite my wishes, my rhabdophobia conquers everything.  
Jennifer pauses.  
“We both want monshters to all die.”  
Her own posse laughs at this sick joke. I wouldn’t call it a joke. She suddenly points to me and says, “That meansh you, Ashriel!” in a loud voice. Her posse cracks up, and so does Thomas all the way from the other side of the library. Others snicker. All eyes are on me, except for the four-footer’s. I can feel my pale-white face turning beet-red and sweat start to collect under my sweater, coming from my pale skin.. I’m not just embarrassed. I’m mortified.   
Oh… gosh… I think, my sweater starting to get wetter, giving anything to get away from here, even if it means leaving the four-footer alone in a room full of both elementary school and high school bullies. I want to do anything to be able to crawl in a hole and, for once, do what Jennifer Calhoun tells me. For once, I’m submitting to her power.  
I want to die. Or at least disappear forever, and never see anyone again. I want to disappear and have no one know me, so no one can judge me for being a monster. I want to vanish without a trace. To erase my name, to erase all the things that I have done. I want to turn invisible and never return to the world.  
And isn’t that almost the same thing as dying?  
The only one other than Mrs. Morris that doesn’t laugh their Anti Monster-Department fueled laughs is the four-footer, who I notice is napping in the background, his skull in his arms, covered by a hoodie . I can’t help but wonder what he would’ve done had he been awake, had he noticed me being insulted like this.   
Mrs. Morris brings out a special type of anger that I’ve only seen before a few times, and what I think is a mix of frustrated and burnt-out, along with her anger. She slams down her brown, wooden clipboard with the partner plans, not minding if anyone would sneak over and take a look at it, and immediately approaches Jennifer Calhoun, her shadow looming over the smirking bubble-gum blower.  
“Jennifer...Nancy...Calhoun….” Mrs. Morris says with a firm voice that increases in volume- a type of voice that I have never heard her speak with. My jaw drops slightly. I see the four-footer waking up in the background, his black eyes opening again and startling me again. “If you have one more outburst like that, young lady, then you’re going straight home. You won’t get assigned to a partner, so you’ll just have to find another way to improve your grades all on your own at home. And trust me, that’s a whole lot harder than being here. So if you don’t want that, you need to stop. Understood?”  
Jennifer Calhoun nods and collects her bubblegum back in her mouth. She doesn’t breathe. She doesn’t move. She doesn’t dare breathe. She doesn’t dare move.  
I don’t dare breathe.  
I don’t dare move.  
“Good,” Mrs. Morris says. She looks at Jennifer Calhoun for a few seconds, watching, seeing if she dares breathe, if she dares move, if I dare breathe, if I dare move, before she goes back to announcing names.  
Jennifer Calhoun is DEAD silent, stopping from chewing her gum at once, and so am I, along with the rest of the elementary- schoolers. The high schoolers don’t seem to care. I don’t blame them, they’ve probably either never went to Ebott Elementary School or they’ve just forgotten her.  
But all that aside, Mrs. Morris doesn’t punish anyone that firmly. Anyone, even Jennifer Calhoun. Mrs. Morris doesn’t give out threats. She never, ever speaks with her voice that firm. I begin to realize something.  
Maybe Mrs. Morris isn’t a zombified Anti- Monster Department spoonfeeding victim, like I thought she was.  
Maybe Mrs. Morris is more than I thought.  
Maybe humans in general are much, much more than I thought.  
“Alright, let’s proceed,” says Mrs. Morris. She takes a deep breath, and regains her composure. “When I announce each pairing, the high schooler will come to the middle of the library. Then, the elementary schooler will join the high schooler in the middle. First we have Douglas August. You’ll be paired with Dolores Sanchez- Riviera.”  
Dolores, a tall Hispanic girl with light brown skin, walks towards Douglas, a scrawny high-schooler with freckles and braces. With all the partners that Mrs. Morris calls out, more and more people walk to the middle from either the front or the back of the library until there’s many pairs standing in the middle.  
“Next is Layla Epperson,” continues Mrs. Morris, gesturing to a girl with peach skin and brown, curly hair.“You’ll be paired with Gerald Jackson. Next is Scott Franklin. You’ll be paired with John Appleton. And next is... “  
Mrs. Morris pauses to look at her paper, taking off her glasses for a few moments to lean closer. I listen more attentively, trying to find out the problem. The other kids do, too. I hear a few laughs. Jennifer Calhoun says, “Oh my gawd, can she even read?!”  
“Sansownay-Merriweather Gaster,” she says, a bit slow and hesitant, as if she’s having trouble saying it. When she says it, it sort of sounds like a question.  
All around me, people snicker, mostly high-schoolers. Rosa laughs. “What a name!” she exclaims. I hear Douglas in the middle whispering to Rosa, “She said it wrong, it’s Sansone.” He says it like “San-so-knee”.  
Who the heck calls their kid “Sansone- Merriweather?”  
I look around. Who’s the victim of all the embarrassment? Who’s the kid that Mrs. Morris has to apologize to?  
A few seconds later, I have my answer.  
The four-footer stands up rapidly, realizing Mrs. Morris’ mistake, his chair squeaking against the library floor. He raises his bony hand for a few seconds to draw some attention to himself and puts it back down, slamming it on the table. When he talks, his voice is lower than what I’d expect out of someone that small. Instead of a voice like mine, a teenager’s voice comes out. I thought people who were that short spoke in super- high pitched voices. I’m actually a little startled. I listen to say what the four-footer will say in response to this huge mistake.  
“The name is Sans,” the four-footer replies simply.


End file.
